homily

 Jesus doesn’t look appealing unless we realize that we need Him. The joy of Easter doesn’t mean as much unless we realize the situation we are in.

About a year ago I was worried about my heart. I was experiencing some tightness after exercise but only every once in a while. I had known in the past that I needed to be exercising regularly, but I had wondered if I was doing it right or if I was setting myself up for some kind of tragedy. Ultimately, after a couple stress tests, the doctors said things looked fine, which gave me great joy as I can go back to the wild ride of coffee once again.

But if I never experienced these symptoms and got them checked out, both eight years ago and this past year, then I would never have thought to look into it. It could have meant something very different, and I don’t think I would like the end of that story as much.

Our world sometimes looks over the fact of our weakness and brokenness. While it isn’t good to dwell only on our problems, it also doesn’t help to ignore them or to pass all the blame onto things outside of us.

Saint Peter’s message of the Good News must include the reality of what the people did to Jesus. But we should not think that being born in a different time and place means that we have nothing to regret in our lives and are just peachy-keen with Jesus. Our consciences are always tuned to tell us to do good and avoid evil, even if they are malformed and get some things wrong, and even if we try to rationalize away our culpability.

But getting back to the start of this homily: if we don’t realize we need a savior, then why look to Jesus? If he is just a self-help guru, then we can run to many others for self-fulfillment and self-actualization. There’s all kinds of life¬-coaches out there.

No, the only point of talking about Jesus is because we need a savior, and that means we need to be saved from something. Let’s not fall into the trap of the Pharisee in Jesus’ parable with the tax collector, who thinks the only thing he needs to be saved from is this fallen world of messed up people. When you can face something, you can deal with something. We need to face our sinfulness and let Jesus deal with it as he desires so much, like we heard last week on Divine Mercy Sunday.

A popular mentality in our world today is to affirm our entire selves along the lines of “I’m okay, your okay… It’s all good… Nothing wrong here, nothing to see…” whereas the reality is “I’m not okay, and you’re not okay, but that’s okay.” The reason it’s okay is because Jesus chases into our lives as He did in the upper room and brings His mercy and peace. He will help us to heal. We just need to admit our brokenness. He will forgive us. We just need to face our sins and repent.

Jesus doesn’t look appealing unless we realize that we need Him. The joy of Easter doesn’t mean as much unless we realize the situation we are in.

Living in real freedom is available to us. It’s not easy; it’s scary a lot of the time; but it is worth it.

If you haven’t been to Confession in a long time or have been holding back something from the Lord, ask the Holy Spirit for the courage to show your wounds to Jesus, so He can show you His and set you free.